Cant Keep Quiet!

Do you remember Judge Robert Bork?

He is considered on of the founders of the current judicial conservative movement. He was also nominated to the Supreme Court in 1987 by Ronald Reagan but his nomination was later rejected by the Senate.

It turns out that this advocate for tort reform believes in the phrase “Do as I say, not as I do” rather than leading by example.

Last week Bork filed a lawsuit against the Yale Club in New York City seeking $1 million in compensatory damages. He is also seeking punitive damages.

Bork was scheduled to give a speech at the Yale Club on June 6, 2006. As he tried to mount the dais to give the speech Bork fell and injured his head and leg. According to Bork’s lawsuit, the Yale Club owes him $1 million plus punitive damages because the club “wantonly, willfully, and recklessly” failed to provide adequate safe staging to the dais.

The American Constitution Society blog quotes an except from one of Bork’s articles published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy in 2002. In the quote, Bork claims that capping punitive damages in “constitutionally appropriate:”

State tort law today is different in kind from the state tort law known to the generation of the Framers. The present tort system poses dangers to interstate commerce not unlike those faced under the Articles of Confederation. Even if Congress would not, in 1789, have had the power to displace state tort law, the nature of the problem has changed so dramatically as to bring the problem within the scope of the power granted to Congress. Accordingly, proposals, such as placing limits or caps on punitive damages, or eliminating joint or strict liability, which may once have been clearly understood as beyond Congress’s power, may now be constitutionally appropriate.

To be fair, the Yale Club had no stairs nor a handrail when Bork attempted to climb up to the dais. Does that, however, abdicate Bork of all responsibility for his injuries? Hardly.

Bork made the conscious decision to attempt to climb to a dais of “unreasonable” height that was missing stairs or a handrail. No one forced the man to make that decision. Since the choice was his, he should accept the consequences.

I don’t have a problem with Bork asking for compensatory damages from the Yale Club. The club does hold some responsiblity for not having either stairs or a handrail. It’s the punitive damages that Bork’s lawsuit seeks that makes him a hypocrite in my eyes.

A man who feels that strict liability should be eliminated and that punitive damages should be limited, is being hypocritical to ask for punitive damages “in an amount to be proven at trial.” Especially when the lawsuit claims that the Yale Club was “wanton, willful, and reckless.” Careless and stupid, yes, but not “wanton, willful, and reckless.” If anyone’s actions fit that description, it’s Bork’s attempt to climb up to the dais unaided.

Cross posted at Bring It On!